Hillary Clinton at a campaign event in Iowa. (Photo: Keiko Hiromi/Polaris/Newscom)
In a column I wrote in early July, based on research by my colleagues and my own analysis of government documents and eyewitness statements, I argued that in 2011 and 2012 then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton waged a secret war on the governments of Libya and Syria, with the approval of President Obama and the consent of congressional leadership from both parties and in both houses of Congress.
I did err in that column with respect to an arms dealer named Marc Turi. I regret the error and apologize for it. I wrote that Turi sold arms to Qatar as part of Clinton’s scheme to get them into the hands of rebels. A further review of the documents makes it clear that he applied to do so but was denied permission, and so he did not sell arms to Qatar. Other arms dealers did.
I also erred when referring to Qatar as beholden to Washington. In fact, Qatar is in bed with the Muslim Brotherhood and is one of the biggest supporters of global jihad in the world — and Clinton, who approved the sales of arms to Qatar expecting them to make their way to Syrian and Libyan rebels, as they did, knew that. She and her State Department caused American arms to come into the possession of known al-Qaida operatives, a few of whom assassinated U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens.
When Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., asked Clinton in January 2013 at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing whether she knew of any weapons coming from the U.S. and going to rebels in the Middle East, she denied such knowledge. She either has a memory so faulty that she should not be entrusted with any governmental powers, or she knowingly lied.
It gets worse.
It now appears that Clinton was managing her war using emails that she diverted through a computer server owned by her husband’s charitable foundation, even though some of her emails contained sensitive and classified materials. This was in direct violation of federal law, which requires all in government who possess classified or sensitive materials to secure them in a government-approved venue.
The inspector general of the intelligence community and the inspector general of the State Department each have reviewed a limited sampling of her emails that were sent or received via the Clinton Foundation server, and both have concluded that materials contained in some of them were of such gravity that they were obliged under federal law to refer their findings to the FBI for further investigation.
The FBI does not investigate for civil wrongdoing or ethical lapses. It investigates behavior that may be criminal or that may expose the nation’s security to jeopardy. It then recommends either that indictments be sought or the matter be addressed through non-prosecutorial means. Given Clinton’s unique present position — as the president’s first secretary of state and one who seeks to succeed him, as well as being the wife of one of his predecessors — it is inconceivable that she could be prosecuted as Gen. David Petraeus was (for the crime of failing to secure classified materials) without the personal approval of the president himself.
Let’s be realistic and blunt: If the president wants Clinton prosecuted for failing to secure classified materials, then she will be, no matter the exculpatory evidence or any political fallout. If he does not want her prosecuted, then she won’t be, no matter what the FBI finds or any political fallout.
I have not seen the emails the inspectors general sent to the FBI, but I have seen the Clinton emails, which are now in the public domain. They show Clinton sending or receiving emails to and from her confidante Sid Blumenthal and one of her State Department colleagues using her husband’s foundation’s server, and not a secure government server. These emails address the location of French jets approaching Libya, the location of no-fly zones over Libya and the location of Stevens in Libya. It is inconceivable that an American secretary of state failed to protect and secure this information.
But it is not inconceivable that she would lie about it.
Federal statutes provide for three categories of classified information. “Top secret” is data that, if revealed, could likely cause grave damage to national security. “Secret” is data that, if revealed, could likely cause serious damage to national security. “Confidential” is data that, if revealed, could likely cause some damage to national security. Her own daily calendars, which she regularly emailed about, are considered confidential.
Clinton has repeatedly denied ever sending or receiving data in any of these categories. She probably will argue that an email that fails to use the terminology of the statute cannot be deemed classified. Here the inspectors general have corrected her. It is the essence of the data in an email — its potential for harm if revealed — that makes its contents classified and the failure to protect it a crime — not the use of a magic word or phrase in the subject line.
She is no doubt lying again, just as she did to the Senate Armed Services Committee. Yet the question remains: Why did she use her husband’s foundation’s computer server instead of a government server, as the law requires? She did that so she could obscure what the server recorded and thus be made to appear different according to history from how she was in reality. Why did she lie about all this? Because she thinks she can get away with it.
Will American voters let her?
